First Bagherzadeh was killed, gunned down outside her parents' Galleria townhouse complex in January 2012. Eleven months later, Irsan's son-in-law died after being shot multiple times in the northwest Harris County apartment he shared with his wife.

Now 56-year-old Irsan has been indicted in Bagherzadeh's death, according to Harris County charging documents released Thursday. The bizarre case captured national attention, carried the highest Crime Stoppers reward in history - $200,000 - and fueled widespread rumors that foreign governments were involved.

Bagherzadeh had moved from Tehran just four years before, and had spoken out publicly against the Iranian regime. Christian converts like her are often executed in Iran.

Translator

To read this article in one of Houston's most-spoken languages, click on the button below.

Now Irsan is in federal custody, though it's not clear on what charges. No charges have been filed in the killing of 28-year-old Coty Beavers, who was married to Irsan's daughter Nesreen. But family and friends of the two say the indictment confirms what they suspected from the moment Bagherzadeh was killed, and which was only cemented by Beavers' slaying months later.

"Gelareh was this Westernized girl from a Muslim country," said Cory Beavers, Coty's identical twin. "(Irsan) thought it was her influence making Nesreen leave home."

Couple met at college

Cory Beavers first met Nesreen Irsan at Lone Star Community College. She was shy and naive, he said, and largely prevented from going out. He introduced her to Coty, who'd had a string of failed relationships.

"They just both fell for each other," Cory Beavers said. "They were head over heels in love to the point that it was pretty nauseating to be around them."

Nesreen transferred to The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, where she studied molecular genetics. She befriended Bagherzadeh, a classmate, and introduced her to Cory Beavers. Soon those two also were dating.

But in the Spring home Nesreen shared with her husband, life was stressful. They moved in together after marrying in the summer of 2011 in a civil ceremony so as not to attract attention. She was afraid of her father, Beavers said.

At the same time, she fell out with her sister, Nadia, a classmate of Bagherzadeh's at M.D. Anderson. That summer Nadia Irsan withdrew from school and didn't return in the fall.

The father, meanwhile, was canvassing the couple's neighborhood, handing out pictures of Coty Beavers and claiming he was trying to find his daughter, Cory Beavers said.

Even after they obtained a protective order against him, the elder Irsan would show up unannounced or call in the middle of the night, Beavers said.

"He had a very fundamentalist interpretation of Islam and believed that (Irsan) was supposed to marry a guy that he chooses," he said.

It wasn't the first time one of his children had defied Ali Isran, relatives say. He was furious, they say, when another daughter, Nasemah, married a Houston man of whom he disapproved.

Self-defense claim

In September 1999, Ali Irsan killed 29-year-old Amjad Alidam with a 12-gauge shotgun in the Tower Glen community in east Montgomery County. He claimed his son-in-law was abusing his daughter and had threatened him and his family.

The Montgomery County District Attorney's office did not charge Irsan because it appeared the shooting was in self-defense, according to newspaper archives. A district attorney spokesman didn't return calls seeking comment.

Meanwhile, Bagherzadeh had moved to Houston to join her parents in 2007, turning her back on life for women under Iran's oppressive Islamic regime.

Friends have said she told them she was once arrested for not wearing the correct dress, and had been strictly disciplined for dating a man who was considered inappropriate.

She told them she was so sick of Islam that she converted to Christianity and was baptized at Second Baptist Church. In the wake of Iran's 2009 presidential elections, widely regarded as fraudulent, Bagherzadeh joined dozens of Houston Iranians in protest, even appearing on TV.

On Jan. 15, 2012, she was driving from the Beavers' home in Spring when she was shot while turning into her parents' town home complex in the 800 block of Augusta. She was chatting with a friend on the phone, who told police he heard her scream before her car crashed into a garage.

Police say the assailant fired several times at close range through the glass of her passenger window.

Immediately, Cory Beavers suspected Irsan, telling police he thought the father possibly mistook Bagherzadeh for Nesreen in the dark, since both had similar features and builds. Or, he told police, Irsan blamed Bagherzadeh for giving his daughter the courage to go against his wishes.

Eleven months later, in November 2012, Nesreen Irsan came home from her job at a genetics laboratory to find her husband dead of multiple gunshot wounds inside their northwest Harris County apartment.

Cory Beavers said he knew what had happened as soon as he received the 1 a.m. phone call.

"My brother told lots of people that if he was ever murdered, it's Ali Irsan," Beavers said. "He was pretty worried about it."

Two houses searched

On Thursday, federal authorities and Montgomery County deputies searched a home on Irwin Keel Lane that is registered to Irsan.

A U.S. Attorney's Office spokeswoman said in a statement that the search was related to a fraud investigation in which three people have been detained. They are expected to appear before a U.S. magistrate judge on Friday.

Neighbors said they've complained about hearing "deep booms" and assault weapons fired from the property, whose residents they said are from Jordan.

A few blocks away, crime scene tape also surrounded another house on White Oak Road where neighbors said a man was taken into custody Thursday. William Orr, a 42-year-old electrician, said agents "swooped in like a SWAT raid with flash grenades and assault rifles."

Orr said the property owner had acted oddly in recent months, showing up at "all hours of the day and night to walk the perimeter, check the fence line - weird stuff."

Cory Beavers said he's relieved that Ali Irsan is in custody, having feared for his safety as well. Still, Beavers said, both his brother and his girlfriend are dead. He said he's reminded of them daily, and suddenly, "like a tsunami that just washes over you."